A Structured Safety Planning Guide · Guide PS-002 · 5 min read
A safety plan, in questions.
Seven questions to answer while you are steady, and take to someone you trust.
If you are in danger right now, do not read on.
Go straight to Immediate Support for crisis numbers in The Bahamas and the United States. This page is for a calmer hour, not an emergency.
Why questions, and not a form
A safety plan is not a document you produce and file away. It is a short set of decisions made in advance, while you are steady, about what you will do when you are not. The value is in having already answered, so that the answer does not have to be found in the worst hour.
Plans made alone tend to stay theoretical. Worked through with a counsellor, a crisis line, or one person who knows you, the same questions become specific: a name, a number, a room, a thing to do with your hands. Specific is what holds.
Clinical Perspective
Safety planning is a recognized, structured intervention, developed by Barbara Stanley and Gregory Brown. It is brief, it is collaborative, and it is not the same as asking someone to promise they will be fine. The questions below follow that structure.
"The point is not to predict the worst day. It is to be less alone inside it."
The seven questions
Answer them in order. You can type into each box and copy or print your answers at the end. Nothing you write is saved or sent anywhere. It stays in this browser until you close the page, so copy it out before you go.
What tells me it is starting?
Most people have a pattern before a crisis rather than a sudden drop. Naming yours buys time.
- What changes first: sleep, appetite, how much I am speaking to people?
- What thoughts start showing up that are not usually there?
- What did the last few difficult weeks look like from the outside?
- Who noticed before I did?
One or two signs is enough. A long list is hard to remember when it counts.
What settles me, without anyone else?
Things you can do alone, in the room you are in, that lower the intensity even slightly.
- What has helped before, even for ten minutes?
- What can I do with my hands?
- What can I put on: music, a program, a recording of a voice I know?
- Where in my home do I feel least bad?
This is not about fixing the feeling. It is about getting through the next hour.
Where can I go, and who is there?
Places and people that interrupt the spiral, without needing a conversation about it.
- Which place makes me feel less closed in?
- Whose company is easy: someone I do not have to explain myself to?
- Is there somewhere open late that I can sit?
Who can I tell?
People you can say the true thing to. Not everyone who loves you belongs on this list, and that is allowed.
- Who would I trust with this, and not be managed by afterwards?
- How would I start the sentence?
- What do I want them to do: stay, listen, drive me somewhere, sit in silence?
- Have I told them they are on this list?
Telling someone in advance that you might call is most of the work. It makes the call possible later.
Who do I call when it is urgent?
Named services and numbers, saved in your phone before you need them.
- Which crisis line covers where I am?
- Is my counsellor’s contact and after-hours guidance saved?
- Which hospital or emergency service would I go to?
- Who could take me there?
The Bahamas and United States numbers are on the Immediate Support page. Save them now rather than later.
What needs to be harder to reach?
The hardest question, and the one that changes outcomes most. Distance and delay matter.
- What would I be most likely to use?
- Who could hold it, lock it, or take it out of the house?
- What would slow me down by even a few minutes?
- Am I willing to ask someone to do this for me today?
Asking someone to hold something for you is not a loss of independence. It is a decision made by the version of you that wants to still be here.
What is worth staying for?
Not a reason to be grateful. Something specific that is still yours: a person, an animal, an unfinished thing, a place you want to see again.
- Who would I want to see one more time?
- What have I not finished?
- What small thing do I still look forward to in a normal week?
- What would I want said about how I treated people?
Keep this one short and concrete. It is the part people read back to themselves.
Take it with you
A plan you cannot reach is not a plan. Copy your answers into your notes app, or print this page and give a copy to one person.
"You are allowed to make it harder for the worst hour to win."
What to remember
- A plan made while steady is easier to follow than a decision made while not.
- Specific beats thorough. One name and one number you will actually use.
- Give it to someone. A plan nobody else knows about is only a private intention.
- Revisit it. What helped last year may not be what helps now.
Working through this with someone
These questions are a starting point, not a substitute for care. If you would like to work through them properly, that can be the whole of a first conversation.
About the author
Ione Hepburn, MA, LPCC, NCC, CLC, C-MI, is a Licensed Professional Clinical Mental Health Counselor licensed in the State of New Mexico, a National Certified Counselor, Certified Life Coach, Certified Meditation Instructor, and author of Lessons from a Friend. She works from Gestalt, mindfulness, motivational interviewing, person-centred and Gottman Method approaches.
Based in Nassau, The Bahamas, she works with individuals and couples, online in New Mexico and throughout The Bahamas, and in person in Nassau. Her writing draws on her own lived experience as much as her clinical training.
Selected references
- Stanley, B., & Brown, G. K. (2012). Safety Planning Intervention: A Brief Intervention to Mitigate Suicide Risk. Cognitive and Behavioral Practice, 19(2), 256–264.
- Stanley, B., Brown, G. K., et al. (2018). Comparison of the Safety Planning Intervention With Follow-up vs Usual Care of Suicidal Patients Treated in the Emergency Department. JAMA Psychiatry, 75(9), 894–900.
- 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (United States). Call or text 988.
This guide is intended for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional mental health treatment. If you are experiencing psychological distress, please consult a licensed mental health professional.
Published September 2026 · Reviewed by Ione Hepburn, MA, LPCC, NCC · Next review September 2027
www.cultivatingclearpaths.com · start@cultivatingclearpaths.com
Part of the Cultivating ClearPaths Psychoeducation Guide Series — A Safety Plan, in Questions · PS-002 · © 2026 Cultivating ClearPaths. All Rights Reserved.
Answering these questions once makes the next hard hour survivable.
Working through a safety plan properly, with someone who knows what to ask, can be the whole of a first conversation. You do not have to do it alone.